after Sylvia Plath’s ‘Child’
Your half-moons are the ten absolutely fabulous things.
I want to streak them with Covergirl, Puck,
Museums of dew
Whose waves you intonate –
Grape hyacinth, tall Paperwhite,
Small, small
Reed without rimple,
Lagoons in which figures
Should fire like the maniple
Not this disgust-
Ing Oberon, this stark
Pan-Cake without sparkle.
Stuart Barnes lives in Melbourne, where he edits PASH capsule, a Facebook journal of contemporary love poetry. He’s currently working on a manuscript, ‘Blackouts and other poems’, that’s dedicated to the memory of Gwen Harwood, who encouraged the eleven-year-old him to write poetry. Poems are forthcoming in Windmills, Southerly, Blasphemy, Mascara Literary Review, & Assaracus: A Journal of Gay Poetry (USA).